“HERMES, COULD YOU do me a favor?”
Every part of me tenses. Whenever Zeus asks for a favor rather than just commanding an order, the results are never good. The favor typically involves doing something that is sure to upset one of the other gods. And unfortunately, one can’t simply say no to Zeus.
“Am I going to be on someone’s dark side if I do this favor?”
Zeus shrugs. The shrug and the feigned look of innocence that accompanies it scream to me that the answer to my question is yes.
“What is it?” I ask.
“Well,” Zeus drapes an arm around my shoulder, “while Hera’s away at this party, I was hoping you could just pop off and get Io for me.”
A bolt of electricity races through me. Hera has still not apologized for allowing Ares and Aphrodite to flaunt their lust in front of me. She has not offered one word of regret for the pain she inflicted on me to further her own goals. Bringing Io back to Zeus would be the perfect retribution for what she has done to me.
But I am not Hera. She has been my friend, my ally, my defender against the other gods including Zeus for too many years, too many lifetimes. I would not willingly cause her to feel the hollowness in her chest as I do every time I watch Ares’s hand slink around Aphrodite’s waist. Whenever I see them together, I think I should reveal Ares for the plot he was trying to hatch. But with Pelias dead and the plan thwarted, I can’t bring myself to send Zeus’s wrath down on Ares or myself for hiding the information for so long.
“Can’t you just pick another mortal to bed?”
Zeus pulls his arm away and rolls his eyes.
“I don’t know why I thought you would understand. Io is so—” He pauses as if straining for the right word while I tap a winged sandal in annoyance. I know too well that in the months since Io’s capture, Zeus has sampled many other women, but his inability to have Io makes her all that more attractive to him. It’s a feeling I can relate to all too well. “She’s so good.” Zeus throws every speck of lasciviousness into the final word. “It’s not fair she be trapped by Hera’s dragon.”
“If Hera hates me for this—”
“She needn’t know. I’ll do better at keeping Io a secret this time.”
I doubt that. Zeus is like an uncontrollable force with a nasty habit of bragging about his conquests, of granting them unearthly favors, and of getting them pregnant. His secrets are about as well-kept as a brothel whore’s virginity.
“I really have no choice, do I?”
“No, but it’s nice I asked, isn’t it?”
“Oh, wonderful indeed,” I say as my ankle wings give a petulant flick.
I snap my fingers, leaving Zeus in a flash of light. Moments later, I’m hovering over the Garden of the Hesperides, a tranquil and abundant oasis currently sprouting in the middle of nowhere in southeastern Osteria. A high, golden fence surrounds the garden that even now in the first days of winter bursts with citrus, apples, plums, and nuts ready to be picked. The cloudless sky forces me to squint my eyes against the sun as I stare up at the new feature Hera installed to keep Io captive without giving the mortal woman free rein of the godly greenspace. Rising up in a vertical line from the main garden stands a rock face at the top of which lives Hera’s hundred-eyed dragon that, along with a band of nymphs, guards this place. As with others of his species, the dragon never sleeps on his own accord making him a much better guardian than Atlas’s daughters who tend to get easily distracted from their duties. Case in point, none of them notice as I land on a path that curves through the citrus grove.
After a quick scan of the garden to see if the nymphs are on duty, my twin pair of wings fly me up to the plateau at the top of the cliff. When I land, the dragon grumbles and arches its back like an angry cat. But he knows I am a god and makes no move to attack. Io, whose heart-shaped face possesses a delicate beauty even I can appreciate, lounges on a chaise plucking a piece of honeyed chevre from a plate of cheese and fruit. As she languidly licks the honey from her slim fingers, she gives no indication of being captive or distressed.
“Why are you here?” she asks as she tosses the dragon an orange. The beast snaps its head up and catches the fruit in midair. As he chews, the air fills with the floral-sweet scent of citrus.
“I guess I’ve come to rescue you.”
Io rolls her eyes and flops back into her lounge chair. “I would prefer if you didn’t.”
“Zeus wants you back.”
Io’s eyes widen. “Oh gods, no. Please. It’s a bit boring here, but the nymphs get me what I want.” She swings her legs around to sit up and indicates a harp, a pile of books, and several games to her left. “Don’t make me go back to him.”
“He’s under the impression he loves you.”
Io bolts from the couch. The dragon’s spiked tail whips in agitation as his hundred eyes lock on Io, watching his charge pace along the cliff top muttering, “No.” She stops in front of me and crosses her arms over her chest. Her face, the pleading worry completely erased, tightens with determination.
“He’s sick, truly sick. I mean I wouldn’t mind if Zeus would just bed me in a human form. I imagine that might be nice. But he insists on taking me as all manner of creatures – first an eagle, then a bull.” A shudder of disgust passes through her before she turns away from me. “It’s sick. The things I’ve been made to do. I won’t go back.”
The dragon grumbles a low, resonant, lion-like warning. The air’s citrusy scent is replaced by the stench of sulfur.
I watch Io’s back for a moment. I wonder at the way of the world. This woman causes Hera so much pain, but yet has no desire for Zeus. I think again of how retrieving Io will hurt Hera. A small part of me, the cruel part all of us gods carry, wants to hurt Hera. After all, she gave no second thought to hurting me. But I have learned to tame my cruelty. Still, this is Zeus’s command. I try to think like Hera, to imagine some bargain I could make with Zeus to keep Io a complete secret from Hera. The idea flashes in my mind faster than I can fully form the thought. For Zeus to keep Io, he must place a new ban on Ares. I would rather not see him at all than to watch him playing the lover to Aphrodite.
With renewed hope, I take my chance and step forward to grab Io, but the moment I move toward her, the dragon growls sending out wisps of fire from his mouth. Being immortal, I have no personal fear of the fire. Despite the sting it may cause, the flames will give me no lasting damage. But one sneeze, one angry huff from the beast and my wings will be ruined. I have no desire to fight. I will win of course, dragons are meant to deter mortals, not gods, but why bother when I have the skill to put a dragon, and a mortal for that matter, under my control?
I grab the harp and strike a chord, a minor chord, moody and somnolent. Before plucking the first bar of my tune, Io whirls around and lunges for the instrument. My wings flutter me just out of her reach.
“Don’t you dare,” Io screams. She runs toward the chaise and reaches into the fruit basket beside it. I land, continuing to play as Io hurls an apple that thuds against my helmet.
“Mind the wings, dear,” I say as my fingers dance through the notes of the fourth bar. The dragon still rumbles his verbal warnings, but the growls mix with snorting snores that jerk him awake. Unfortunately, Io still retains perfect aim and, despite my ducks and dodges, my helmet endures a couple more direct hits. By the eighth bar, Io is still throwing fruit, but her strength is leaving her as harp-induced exhaustion takes over. The music has its effect on the dragon as well; his head now sways as his hundred eyelids droop. On the tenth bar, Io slumps onto the couch. At the same instant, just as I am about to head into the final notes, both members of my audience drop their heads into slumber.
I finish the final bar of the lullaby before putting the harp back where I found it. I then scoop Io into my arms. With a mortal in my care I can’t simply snap back to Olympus and must rely on my wings to fly me the distance home. Io’s extra weight will put a strain on my wings. It will be days before the poor things are in full form again. Not for the first time this day, I curse Zeus’s desires.
My helmet wings beat to give me lift as my ankle wings propel me forward to launch me and my passenger from the cliff. From the wobbly lift off I’m certain that one of Io’s fruity missiles has damaged a helmet wing. Damn Io. Damn Zeus. The injury will make maneuvering difficult, but there is nothing I can do for the wing until I return to Olympus.
As we fly north, clouds stalk up behind us like mountain cats waiting for the right moment to attack. An eerie tingle drips along my spine. I try to play it off as ridiculous, but every time I dare to glance back the thunderhead looms larger, taller, darker. I urge my wings to beat faster. The more vigorous pace exaggerates the wobble from the injured wing but I press aside the queasiness it gives me as I push my wings to hurry their way to Olympus.
It’s over the Illamos Valley that the attack comes. Knowing I shouldn’t, knowing I should just maintain my momentum, but unable to resist the nagging curiosity, I look back. The sight startles me so deeply, I nearly drop Io. Typhon’s face fills the cloud that has turned as black as a dragon’s heart. A cruel grin creeps over the cloud as Typhon hurls a lightning bolt at me.
I throw myself forward. Io’s extra weight causes me to overshoot the maneuver, tipping me off balance. I squeeze Io to me as the lightning whizzes only two finger widths under us. The bolt misses my body, but the scent of electricity coming off the flash of light fills my senses. Just as I am about to right myself another bolt hurtles over me, closer this time, close enough to singe the tips of my sandal wings. Vile disgust floods over me when the smell of burnt feathers hits my nostrils. There are limits to my patience, especially when my wings are threatened. I right myself and whirl around.
“What do you think you’re doing?” I yell. My heart pounds blood through my ears.
“Drop her and I’ll stop,” Typhon says in a booming taunt.
“What do you want with her?” I ask clutching Io tighter. Even if she may cost me a month of wing repair, she doesn’t deserve to die.
“I want to make Zeus wake up.” He says this steadily, almost a monotone, but behind the words lurks a ferocity that sends a ripple of terror through me. As if projected on the screen in Portaceae’s arena, I see clearly what is happening: Typhon wants war and Io will be the spark to the fire. Like a bolus of flame from a dragon’s core, a fury wells up in my chest. I will not give in to Typhon. Zeus’s lust is not worth another battle against the titans.
I whip away from Typhon, straining to make my wings beat faster. Their efforts create a hummingbird buzz, but the wings, which aren’t meant for such sustained speed, are now damaged and burnt and can’t bear the effort. I dive low hoping if I do drop Io the fall will not be far enough to cause her lasting harm. But Typhon’s momentum, Typhon’s overall force is too great.
A gust hurtles toward me blowing off my helmet. Keeping my left arm tight around Io, I snatch the helmet with my right hand. Thunder shakes my bones as I struggle to seat the helmet on my head. Typhon floods a torrent of rain over me. The sodden and singed wings make every attempt to continue, but eventually tuck themselves against my helmet and sandals. I will have to land. As I prepare for the descent, a flash of light blinds me. My body overflows with agony so gripping I cannot even cry out.
Later, I will swear what hit me was lightning, but truly I have never seen anything of its kind. Zeus’s bolts shoot jagged lines from sky to ground just as Typhon’s earlier electrical attacks had. What hits me just as I spot a landing area is like a heavy boulder of electricity forced straight into my body.
The shock reverberates through me like vibrations on harp strings. My entire being crackles as the jolt races from my core to my extremities. And from my extremities into Io. Her sleeping eyes fly open and her arms seize me. She sucks in a ragged gasp of shock. Then, as if she’s been deflated, Io goes limp. Smoke tendrils dance from her hair, but are quickly extinguished by the clouds’ misty drizzle.
Knowing it is futile to take her to Olympus, I perform my duty, my job in addition to being the gods’ messenger. I deliver Io to Hades so she can take her place among the dead in his Chasm.